Essential Electronic Design Automation (EDA)

Physical Layout Tools

Larry:	The actual physical creation of the chip mask patterns is called layout. For a house, an architect draws a detailed layout plan showing where each room, window, and pipe goes in the house. An IC layout designer “draws” where each major block, cell, gate, transistor, or wire goes on the chip.
Nora:	I understand what a house floorplan is. What is the floorplan for an IC?

Floorplanning Tools

Larry:

Floorplanning is the procedure which the IC designer uses to position each major block on the chip (like locating rooms in the house example). While an architect is concerned about the “people flow” between the rooms, the IC layout designer is concerned about the “signal flow” between the blocks. Initial floorplanning can be done ...